In an attempt to decide whether a person induces his/her attitude as an observer without accessing his/her internal states, Bem looked into the interpersonal simulations, in which an “observer-participant” is given a detailed description of one condition of a [[cognitive dissonance]] experiment. Subjects listened to a tape of a man enthusiastically describing a tedious peg-turning task. Some subjects were told that the man had been paid $20 for his testimonial and another group was told that he was paid $1. Those in the latter condition thought that the man must have enjoyed the task more than those in the $20 condition. The results obtained were similar to the original Festinger-Carlsmith experiment. Because the observers, who did not have access to the actors’ internal cognition and mood states, were able to infer the true attitude of the actors, it is possible that the actors themselves also arrive at their attitudes by looking at their own behavior from an observer’s standpoint.

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{{Main|Self perception theory}}

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In an attempt to decide whether a person induces his/her attitude as an observer without accessing his/her internal states, Bem looked into the interpersonal simulations, in which an “observer-participant” is given a detailed description of one condition of a [[cognitive dissonance]] experiment. Subjects listened to a tape of a man enthusiastically describing a tedious peg-turning task. Some subjects were told that the man had been paid $20 for his testimonial and another group was told that he was paid $1. Those in the latter condition thought that the man must have enjoyed the task more than those in the $20 condition. The results obtained were similar to the original Festinger-Carlsmith experiment. Because the observers, who did not have access to the actors’ internal cognition and mood states, were able to infer the true attitude of the actors, it is possible that the actors themselves also arrive at their attitudes by looking at their own behavior from an observer’s standpoint.

Self-perception theory (SPT) is an account of attitude change developed by psychologistDaryl Bem[1][2] It asserts that we develop our attitudes by observing our behavior and concluding what attitudes must have caused them. The theory is counterintuitive in nature noting that we always presume that attitudes come prior to behaviors. Furthermore, the theory suggests that a person induces his attitudes without accessing to his internal cognition and mood states.[3] He reasons his own overt behaviors rationally in the same way he attempts to explain others’ behaviors.

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In an attempt to decide whether a person induces his/her attitude as an observer without accessing his/her internal states, Bem looked into the interpersonal simulations, in which an “observer-participant” is given a detailed description of one condition of a cognitive dissonance experiment. Subjects listened to a tape of a man enthusiastically describing a tedious peg-turning task. Some subjects were told that the man had been paid $20 for his testimonial and another group was told that he was paid $1. Those in the latter condition thought that the man must have enjoyed the task more than those in the $20 condition. The results obtained were similar to the original Festinger-Carlsmith experiment. Because the observers, who did not have access to the actors’ internal cognition and mood states, were able to infer the true attitude of the actors, it is possible that the actors themselves also arrive at their attitudes by looking at their own behavior from an observer’s standpoint.

There are numerous researches conducted by psychologists that support the self-perception theory, demonstrating that emotions do follow behaviors. For example, it is found that corresponding emotions (including liking, disliking, happiness, anger, etc.) were reported following from their overt behaviors, which had been manipulated by the experimenters.[4] These behaviors included making different facial expressions, gazes and postures. In the end of the experiment, subjects inferred and reported their affections and attitudes from their practiced behaviors despite the fact that they were told previously to act that way.

Evidence of the self-perception theory can also be seen in real life situations. After teenagers participated in repeated and sustained volunteering services, their attitudes were demonstrated to have shifted to be more caring and considerate towards others.[5]

Firstly, for therapies, self-perception theory holds a different view of psychological problems from the traditional perspectives which suggest that those problems come from the inner part of the clients. Instead, self-perception theory perspective suggests that people attribute their inner feelings or abilities from their external behaviors.[6] If those behaviors are maladjusted ones, people will attribute those maladjustments to their poor adapting abilities and thus suffer from the corresponding psychological problems. Thus, we can make use of this concept to treat clients with psychological problems that are resulted from maladjustments by guiding or giving suggestions to them to firstly change their behaviors and later the ‘problems’.

One of the most famous therapies making use of this concept is therapy for‘Heterosocial Anxiety'.[7][8] In this case, the assumption is that an individual perceives that he or she has poor social skills because he/she has no dates. Experiments showed that males with heterosocial anxiety perceived less anxiety with females after several sessions of therapy in which they engaged in a 12-minute, purposefully biased dyadic social interactions with a separate female. From these apparently successful interactions, the males inferred that their heterosocial anxiety was reduced. This effect is shown to be quite long-lasting as the reduction in perceived heterosocial anxiety resulted in a significantly greater number of dates among subjects 6 months later.

Secondly, self-perception theory is in fact an underlying mechanism for the effectiveness of many marketing or persuasive techniques. One typical example is the foot-in-the-door technique, which is a widely-used marketing technique for persuading target customers to buy products. The basic premise of this technique is that, once a person complies with a small request (e.g. filling in a short questionnaire), he/she will be more likely to comply with a more substantial request which is related to the original request (e.g. buying the related product).[9][10][11][12] The idea is that the initial commitment on the small request will change one’s self image, therefore giving reasons for agreeing with the subsequent, larger request. It is because people observe their own behaviors (paying attention to and complying with the initial request) and the context in which they behave (no obvious incentive to do so), and thus infer they must have a preference for those products.

The self-perception theory was intially proposed as an alternative to explain the experimental findings of the cognitive dissonance theory, and there were debates as to whether people experience attitude changes as an effort to reduce dissonance or as a result of self-perception processes. Basing on the fact that the self-perception theory differs from the cognitive dissonance theory in that it does not hold that people experience a "negative drive state" called "dissonance" which they seek to relieve, the following experiment was carried out to compare the two theories under different conditions.

An early study on cognitive dissonance theory shows that people indeed experience arousal when their behavior is inconsistent with their previous attitude. Waterman[13] designed an experiment in which participants were asked to write an essay arguing against the position they agreed. Then they were asked immediately to perform a simple task and a difficult task and their performance in both tasks were assessed. It was found that they performed better in the simple task and worse in the difficult task, compared to those who had just written an essay corresponding to their true attitude. As indicated by social facilitation, enhanced performance in simple tasks and worsened performance in difficult tasks shows that arousal is produced by people when their behavior is inconsistent with their attitude. Therefore, the cognitive dissonance theory is evident in this case.

Whether cognitive dissonance or self-perception is a more useful theory is a topic of considerable controversy and a large body of literature. There are some circumstances where either theory is preferred, but it is traditional to use the terminology of cognitive dissonance theory by default. The cognitive dissonance theory accounts attitude changes when people’s behaviors are inconsistent with their original attitudes which are clear and important to them; while the self-perception theory is used when those original attitudes are relatively ambiguous and less important. Studies have shown that in constrast to traditional belief, a large proportion of people’s attitudes are weak and vague. Thus, the self-perception theory is signficant in interpreting one’s own attitudes, such as one’s assessment of one’s personality traits[14][15] and whether one would cheat to achieve a goal. [16]